Crème Brulee

Crème brulee had always been a dessert that I would enjoy at restaurants, rather than at home. The smooth custard and perfectly golden layer of sugar just seemed like something better left to the professional pastry chefs. However, earlier this week I felt somewhat confident in trying to recreate restaurant-style crème brulee at home, and with the help of AllRecipes.com, I successfully made it.

Directions:
Preheat the oven to 300° F. Meanwhile, in a saucepan, whisk together the cream, 1/4 cup sugar, and salt. Set over medium heat, and warm until steam rises from the surface. Then in a separate bowl, whisk together the egg yolks and vanilla. When the cream is hot, ladle a little bit into the egg yolks while whisking quickly. Ladle in a bit more to bring the yolks up to a high temperature without scrambling them. Whisk the yolk mixture into the rest of the cream. Ladle into the ramekins.

Bring a large pot of water to a boil. Place a towel in the bottom of a baking dish, and place the filled ramekins on top of the towel. Place in the oven, and pour boiling water carefully into the baking dish until it comes half way up the sides of the ramekins. Cover the dish loosely with aluminum foil. Bake for 35 to 40 minutes in the preheated oven, just until the custard is set. Remove ramekins from the dish, and refrigerate for 6 hours or overnight.

Before serving, sprinkle 1 tablespoon of sugar over the top of each crème brulee. Use a kitchen torch or your oven’s broiler to caramelize the sugar. It may take 2 to 3 minutes in the broiler. Serve immediately.

*Note: this recipe has been altered from original to include recommendations from the recipe comments page

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